Factory Rejects Blame for Lead Poisoning

BEIJING, Aug. 12 -- Copper in Shanghai fell for the second day as a decline in China's new loan growth in July stoked concern that investment demand for the metal may slow.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The metal fell as much as 1.6 percent after China's central bank said yesterday new loans plunged to 355.9 billion yuan ($52 billion), less than a quarter of advances in June. Industrial production climbed 10.8 percent in July, less than economists' median forecast for an 11.5 percent increase in a Bloomberg survey.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &quot;A decline in the July lending figure may spark concerns in the Shanghai copper market, pressuring the market to have a correction after the recent rally,&quot; Tian Gangfeng, analyst at Haitong Futures Co., said in an e-mailed report today.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; November-delivery copper on the Shanghai Futures Exchange fell to as low as 47,710 yuan a metric ton and traded at 48,090 yuan at 11:16 a.m. local time. It fell 0.4 percent yesterday.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Three-month delivery copper on the London Metal Exchange rose 0.6 percent to $6,072 a ton. Copper for September delivery in New York gained 0.6 percent at $2.7560 a pound.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Still, some analysts said the increase in China's scrap copper imports in July was encouraging. China's scrap copper imports jumped by 61 percent to 450,000 tons in July, from 278,922 tons in June, customs said yesterday.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &quot;Imports of scrap surged by two-thirds and domestic production of refined copper products continued to climb, showing that demand from the world's top consumer of the metal stayed hot in the summer,&quot; analysts at Investec Bank (Australia) Ltd., said in a report today.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Among other LME-traded metals, aluminum traded unchanged at $1,930 a ton, and zinc was up 0.8 percent at $1,830 a ton. Nickel was up 0.5 percent at $19,600 a ton. Lead and tin hadn't traded by 9:59 a.m. in Singapore.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; (Source: Bloomberg)
&nbsp;